


and again, and again, and again

by esperink



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Childhood Friends, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Semiverbal Anxiety | Virgil Sanders, i guess?, roman and logan don't have big parts tbh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-28
Updated: 2019-10-28
Packaged: 2021-01-05 15:30:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21210860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/esperink/pseuds/esperink
Summary: or, five times Patton asked, "Can I?"





	and again, and again, and again

**Author's Note:**

> i guess i'm a rarepair writer now ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯  
I don't really ship moxiety, tbh, but this was too good /not/ to write
> 
> stuffs: food mentions throughout, a panic attack and mention of parents arguing in section 2, mention of a storm in section 4, and a kiss or two at the end. I think that’s it?

1.

He was by himself. Sitting against a wall, away from the other kids. Virgil didn’t mind. He supposed he was used to it.

Shoes appeared in front of him and he looked up. A boy with dirty blond hair and freckles grinned at him, waving.

“Hi!” he said. “I’m Patton.”

Virgil recognized him from the classroom. Patton usually sat in one of the front seats and was typically a chatterbox.

“You’re Virgil, right?” Patton asked. When Virgil nodded, Patton smiled again. “Can I sit next to you?” Virgil nodded again, and so Patton took a seat next to him on the concrete.

Patton started to talk as Virgil continued to draw with chalk. He kind of tuned him out until he noticed it was quiet. He looked up again.

Patton was watching him, tilting his head just slightly. “You don’t talk much, do you?”

Virgil blushed and ducked his head, shaking his head no.

Patton brightened nonetheless. “That’s okay! My mom says I talk enough for two people.” He giggled, and Virgil couldn’t help but smile at the sound.

Patton sat next to him at recess and lunch for a week. And then the next week. Virgil half-expected him to stop at any moment, since he didn’t ever really reply.

One day Patton’s shoes stopped in front of Virgil again. The quiet boy looked up, and Patton had a surprisingly thoughtful look on his face.

“Virgil?” he asked, and he sounded almost hesitant. “Are you my friend?”

Virgil blinked at him and looked down in thought. Was that what they were? Friends? Well, they weren’t strangers, at least.

Patton shifting from foot to foot caused Virgil to look back up. Yes, he decided. Maybe that’s what they were. He nodded.

Patton beamed, moving to sit next to him. He offered Virgil his cookie. “Do you want my cookie? I’m allergic.”

2.

Virgil didn’t quite know where he was. His parents had been arguing and he just ran. He hated when they argued. He couldn’t stand it.

Now he was lost in an unfamiliar neighborhood and it was getting hard to breathe.

He’d been sitting there for a bit, head on his knees, when he became aware that there was someone in front of him.

“Virgil?”

He recognized the voice. Patton. He lifted his head just a bit to peek out at him. Patton reached out a hand and Virgil flinched back. Patton quickly retracted the hand and took a few steps back, shoes disappearing from view. He was leaving, wasn’t he? Virgil dug his nails into his palm.

Wait, no – he could hear his voice a few feet away, mingling with two other voices he didn’t recognize.

Patton’s shoes reappeared in Virgil’s vision. “Virgil?” Patton asked again. “Can I touch you?”

Virgil hesitated, but then he nodded. Patton placed a light hand on the back of Virgil’s wrist. “I’m gonna count, okay? My dad taught us this. I’m gonna count to four, and then to seven, and then to eight. You’re supposed to breathe with the numbers.”

Virgil didn’t respond verbally or physically. Patton gently tapped his wrist. “Okay?” he repeated. Virgil nodded, and Patton started counting.

It took a few times for Virgil to start breathing normally again. He looked up and noticed that something was different about Patton. He was wearing round glasses, which he hadn’t been when Virgil saw him at school earlier.

Behind Patton, Virgil could see two other kids that looked the same age as them. One also had glasses (but different frames) and the other had a red paper crown on his head.

Virgil bit his lip and looked back down.

“Oh,” Patton said. “These are my brothers, Logan and Roman. We have the same birthdays!” He clapped a little.

“Triplets,” Logan said with a small adjustment of his glasses, and Patton nodded.

“Yeah, that.” He gestured between his brothers and Virgil. “This is my best friend Virgil!”

Oh.

_Best friend?_

Patton’s brothers greeted Virgil and didn’t mention the lack of verbal response.

Virgil glanced back at Patton, tapping the side of his own head, near his eyes.

“Oh yeah!” Patton said, taking off his glasses to show him. “I got glasses today!”

3.

Virgil sat on a bench near the cafeteria, swinging his legs, (or, at least trying to. He’d grown too much to be able to do it correctly).

He watched the rest of the sixth graders file out of the cafeteria. None of them would be sixth graders after this, and it sort of scared him. It was the last day and the school had decided to celebrate that with an award assembly.

Virgil was just waiting for his mom to pick him up. She was at work and his dad wasn’t in the picture anymore.

“Virgil!”

His head snapped up to see Patton running to him. His brothers trailed behind him.

Patton skidded to a stop right in front of Virgil, and then took a step back in case he was too close. He was grinning at him and his eyes were wet. “Can I hug you?” he asked.

Virgil nodded, slightly confused.

Patton smiled again and hugged him briefly, then he let go and stepped back again. “I just have a lot of feelings,” he said, bringing a hand up to wipe at a tear that had escaped.

“Oh,” Virgil said, and they both pretended that Patton’s eyes didn’t widen at the first word Virgil had said to him since they’d met two years prior.

But Patton just grinned at him again, turning when his brothers had caught up to him. Logan greeted them and Roman reminded Virgil to sign his yearbook.

“I’m so excited for next year!” Patton said. His brothers noticed him start to ramble and quietly slipped away.

Virgil didn’t mind Patton’s rambling at all. He’d come to enjoy it, and he was very much used to it since he was the one who didn’t talk.

“Gosh, I hope we get a lot of classes together,” Patton continued, clutching his yearbook to his chest.

He didn’t get to say much more before a man approached and said, “Hey kiddo, it’s time to go.”

Patton pretended to pout. But then he turned to him and said, “Hi dad! This is Virgil.”

“Ah, so this is the best friend we’ve been hearing about,” Patton’s dad said good-naturedly, but Virgil blushed nonetheless.

“He’s a therapist,” Patton told Virgil proudly. Then he looked thoughtful. “Can I hug you again?”

Virgil nodded, and Patton smiled.

Patton hugged him and then let go. “I’ll see you later,” he said, and Virgil watched as the family left.

4.

It was a dark and stormy night.

Well, no, not really. It was a dark and stormy late afternoon. Virgil had gone over to Patton’s house to do homework and it had started to rain the minute he stepped inside.

It had been alright for a bit, and the boys had gotten some things done, but then the sky darkened, lightning and thunder happened, and the power had gone out.

Patton fretted. Virgil might have found Patton’s fear of storms a little silly if he didn’t care for him so much. If he didn’t find the other teen so… endearing.

Patton turned to him, eyes wide behind his glasses. “Can I… can I hold your hand?”

Virgil offered his hand, and only hummed when Patton latched onto it.

“Sorry,” Patton said softly, and Virgil just shrugged as if to say, ‘it’s okay.’ Patton smiled a little. “Can I… put my head here?” he asked next, tilting his head towards Virgil’s shoulder until getting an okay from him. He snuggled into his side.

Virgil quietly tried not to melt as he continued to work on his homework with his free hand.

“You know, Virge,” Patton said with a small, content sigh, and Virgil hummed in response. “I’m glad we’re friends.” He smiled up at him when Virgil glanced down.

5.

Roman had taken it upon himself to assist Virgil in his quest for his brother’s hand. When he learned that Virgil had a crush on Patton, he insisted on helping with the confession.

“Fine, if you don’t want to say anything to him, maybe you can write him something,” Roman was saying. “You know what people like?”

“Bagels,” Virgil supplied helpfully.

“…No, what?” Roman was nearly confused into silence. Virgil still rarely spoke and when he did, it always seemed to trip Roman up. Not to mention Virgil’s answer did not seem on topic. “Maybe.” He waved a hand. “Um, poetry!”

Virgil raised an eyebrow at him.

“Don’t give me that look,” Roman said. “Poetry has been used for years to express how one feels about someone. Dedicate something to him. Take, for one, Shakespeare’s sonnet 138. Allow me to demonstrate.” Roman cleared his throat and started to recite the poem. “’When my love swears to me that she’ – or, well, ‘he’ in this situation – ‘is made of truth, I do believe her though I know she lies—”

“I’ll stop you right there,” Logan said, causing the other two to jump due to seemingly appearing out of nowhere. “That is about an older man and an unfaithful girl… lying to maintain their relationship.”

Roman opened his mouth and then closed it. “Oh.”

Logan rolled his eyes at Roman’s surprised silence, turning to Virgil. “If you’re going to be using Shakespeare, might I suggest, Shakespeare’s sonnet 18? ‘Shall I compare thee’ –”

The sound of a door opening interrupted him. Patton had arrived home, and he saw them all standing in the kitchen. “Oh, Virgil! What are you doing here?” he asked.

“He was waiting for you,” Roman said helpfully. Without pausing, he said, grabbing Logan’s arm, “Hey, Lo, you wanted to show me that documentary about sharks, right?”

“Well, yes, but—” Logan didn’t get to finish his protest.

“Excellent, let’s go watch it.” Roman dragged a confused Logan out of the room.

Patton watched them go with a slight tilt of his head before turning to Virgil, smiling at him. “You were waiting for me?” he asked.

Virgil nodded, just once. “I—” He hesitated, cutting himself off. Patton’s eyebrows rose in either surprise of curiosity, and Virgil almost immediately lost most of his confidence.

Patton’s expression softened. “Take your time,” he said.

Virgil’s face flushed as he chewed on one of his fingernails for a moment. “I really like you,” he managed to say.

There was only a moments’ pause before Patton beamed up at him. “I really like you too, Virgil.”

Virgil thought that Patton misunderstood, so he shook his head to indicate that no, not in a friendship way, when Patton stopped him.

“Like more than friends, right?”

Virgil blinked, nodding slowly.

Patton just smiled and lifted a hand to hold Virgil’s cheek, stopping before contact to silently ask permission. Virgil leaned into the touch and Patton full-on grinned. “Virgil,” he said, meeting his eyes, “can I kiss you?”

Virgil nodded wordlessly and Patton surged up to press his lips against Virgil’s.

When Patton eventually pulled away, he giggled at the dazed look on Virgil’s face. “Hey Virge,” he said, and Virgil hummed in reply. “Wanna be my boyfriend?”

“God, yes,” Virgil said, and Patton kissed him again.

**Author's Note:**

> come yell at me on tumblr!: esperinkdraws


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